http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog hmmpff, hmmpff … what’s that outside my burrow Mon, 19 Mar 2007 03:05:12 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en The Stock Market is currently going through some significant hickups. I don't quite understand why ... started with something in China, dropped a little here, then bounced back, until the government decided to go after some subprime lenders, and on and on it goes. It has little to do with ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=245 Two articles on the recent fiasco at the Justice Department. First they get busted for the FBI abuses of National Security Letters, now they are on the defensive for having fired US Attorneys for political reasons. The man in the middle is the boss, Alberto Gonzales. The White House is ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=244 The Police is understaffed and trying to recruit local cadets. Turns out the people applying don't have the reading skills to become police officers. Kind of scary that of all the possible options, the point of failure is "reading comprehension" for somebody who is supposed to enforce scores of written ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=243 Usually Kathleen Parker writes articles that I'd rather not remember, but once in a while she does leave me with a few nuggets. Recently there was this about people's earlier discretions coming back to them after having been posted on the web. The scary part here is no that people were ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=242 Two articles coming back to back regarding school lunch programs. Apparently students are being denied lunch, if they lose their lunch tickets. What's worse: having hungry (and fidgety) children in the classroom, or teaching them responsibility by not losing the tickets in the first place. The solution: beg the population. ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=241 Interesting article by a college president questioning the usefulness of the US News and World report College Rankings. There are a few threads to follow: Sarah Lawrence decides to stop using SAT scores, without affects on the students applying. However US News will calculate an arbitrary average SAT score for that ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=240 Here is a short article how the FDA operates, what it can and cannot do, and how we may be legally introducing drugs into the sytem that may come back to bite us later on. There seems quite a bit of risk here that the FDA, as currently practicing, may ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=239 Another example of medical study results being thrown out the window.  In our local paper we couldn't tell who conducted the study. Now this one is a little weird though because there are no references whatsoever on checking back on this study. It also left out the critical bit that ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=238 The voices are getting louder, yet we still don't get the full story. Here is a letter submitted by a local resident about the Iraqi Government signing away its fortune to US oil interests. Why would they do this? Why would they be the only country in the Middle East ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=237 Another bunch of tangled noodles to make sense of. There's apparently a problem with a state law on "Death with Dignity". The disabled are worried about being asked to be killed through "reduced protections." And the law may lead to infant euthanasia (I'm assuming that's a new term for "abortion"?). I ... http://www.wombatburrow.org/blog/?p=236